One of the shittiest things about Skyrim

[oblivionenjoyer]

is how lifeless and static all the NPCs are.

Everyone loves to shit on Oblivion's NPCs but at least they actually DID stuff. They worked a set number of hours, took breaks to eat their meals and clean, went to a bar in the evening, to church at the weekend. A lot even did stuff like visiting friends or family on certain days of the month. In Skyrim, on the other hand, a lot of them don't even SLEEP. Or move at all, for that matter. It's pathetic.

Skyrim's a fun game when you're out in the wilderness stumbling onto shit, but the moment you go to a town, fail to interact at all with half of the NPCs, realise the other half literally don't do anything, and then get a quest that amounts to "kill 3 mudcrabs. reward: join the guild's elite inner circle", it goes to absolute shit. Skyrim is at its best when you avoid all towns and NPCs. The only town that's any fun is Markarth, for that whole prison-rebellion questline. The rest of them are just a string of disappointments.

 

[Xelocix]

Look guys, we've got a groundbreaking new opinion here!!

 

[King Crispy]

In my recent playthrough of Wildlander, I don't think I've encountered a single NPC (in a town or city, that is) that doesn't have some sort of a set schedule. Sure, they don't have much variety in what they say or do, but at times it's almost been... believable? So I'm not really sure what you're talking about.

Shit on Skyrim for what's shitty about it, not for things that aren't true about it.

 

[oblivionenjoyer]

In my recent playthrough of Wildlander, I don't think I've encountered a single NPC (in a town or city, that is) that doesn't have some sort of a set schedule. Sure, they don't have much variety in what they say or do, but at times it's almost been... believable? So I'm not really sure what you're talking about.

Shit on Skyrim for what's shitty about it, not for things that aren't true about it.

Literally not one innkeeper in the entire game sleeps, or has any schedule whatsoever. And it's not just innkeepers either but they're the easiest to go check out yourself.

 

[King Crispy]

I've seen plenty of innkeepers sleep. Sometimes they sleep on a mat that's located right behind their counter. Again, this is in Wildlander. Not sure about vanilla Skyrim.

 

[oblivionenjoyer]

I've seen plenty of innkeepers sleep. Sometimes they sleep on a mat that's located right behind their counter. Again, this is in Wildlander. Not sure about vanilla Skyrim.

Yeah that's a mod feature.

See here for example:
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/49206/?tab=description
A mod like this wouldn't exist if it was a thing in vanilla.

 

[Tyranicon]

Every TES game has removed the best parts of it's predecessors to appeal to the masses.

I bet this, in so many words, is practically enshrined at Beth HQ.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Every TES game has removed the best parts of it's predecessors to appeal to the masses.

I bet this, in so many words, is practically enshrined at Beth HQ.

Add to this the fact that Bethesda games didn't have good parts to begin with, and you have the TES situation in a nut-shell.

 

[Tenebris]

Every TES game has removed the best parts of it's predecessors to appeal to the masses.

I bet this, in so many words, is practically enshrined at Beth HQ.

What more could they possibly do at this point. Reduce it to three skill trees? Stamina/Magicka/Stealth? I think they've started to reach the absolute bottom on how much they can dumb it down for the masses. Any more and the game might as well play itself.

 

[Butter]

There isn't an instrument precise enough to measure the relative shittiness of Skyrim's constituent parts.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

There isn't an instrument precise enough to measure the relative shittiness of Skyrim's constituent parts.

And yet I volunteer every single time.

 

[Tyranicon]

Every TES game has removed the best parts of it's predecessors to appeal to the masses.

I bet this, in so many words, is practically enshrined at Beth HQ.

What more could they possibly do at this point. Reduce it to three skill trees? Stamina/Magicka/Stealth? I think they've started to reach the absolute bottom on how much they can dumb it down for the masses. Any more and the game might as well play itself.

Ha, skill trees are so 2010s.

Wait until they introduce some abomination like battlepass-style progression.

 

[gamerguy]

there's lots of things wrong with skyrim, but let's start with the intro


did anyone ever convince you to play something else better than bethesda did within the first 10 minutes of skyrim?



let me guess, there's a mod :rolleyes

 

[Vic]

there's lots of things wrong with skyrim, but let's start with the intro


did anyone ever convince you to play something else better than bethesda did within the first 10 minutes of skyrim?



let me guess, there's a mod :rolleyes

bro when I first played Skyrim in 2010 I was blown away. It was only after playing it for a very long time that I realized how shallow it actually is. wide as an ocean and deep as a puddle fits quite well.

Still, lots of great memories killing bandits, mining iron ore and collecting flowers until very late in the night.

 

[gamerguy]

the simple fact that there's more mods for skyrim than anything else ought to tell you something... it's a shitty videogame


like many bad RPGs, it's nothing more than the promise of a videogame... just over that next, nope... maybe a new mod... hmmm...

 

[LarryTyphoid]

Almost every single RPG ever has static NPCs without scheduled behaviors, including every single TES game besides Oblivion and Skyrim. This is a weird thing to criticize Skyrim for. I might as well shit on Oblivion for not having NPC schedules as intricate as those seen in Ultima 7. Hell, even a dirt-old JRPG like Dragon Quest 3 has more meaningful changes in NPC behavior between day and night than Oblivion.

 

[Vic]

Almost every single RPG ever has static NPCs without scheduled behaviors, including every single TES game besides Oblivion and Skyrim. This is a weird thing to criticize Skyrim for. I might as well shit on Oblivion for not having NPC schedules as intricate as those seen in Ultima 7. Hell, even a dirt-old JRPG like Dragon Quest 3 has more meaningful changes in NPC behavior between day and night than Oblivion.

check his username

 

[Ash]

I played it on release in 2011. Gave up in disgust after a mere 30 hours and never touched it again. Was sure to shit on it hard every time it was mentioned online and IRL. After 12 years, I thought maybe, just maybe, it can now be salvaged with over a decade of mods. I downloaded 100 gameplay mods - ones to make the combat better. Ones to make the NPCs less lifeless. All the reputable dungeon overhauls I could find. Weapon degredation. Skyshards, iceclaws and unique treasures to make exploration less boring. Saving only at beds to boost challenge and C&C. SkyUI, SkyHUD, offical patch and all the essentials. Mods to remove the level scaling and generous item. Soundtrack expansion to add variety. Survival mode to reduce the casualness. 70% of lockpicks removed. Expanded RPG systems - crafting, enchanting, magic. Mining gives small xp, reading unread books gives small xp. And so on and on. It was a much improved experience but ultimately still a hollow shell and overall unworthy game. Dungeons that are restrained in design. Towns that are no different from one another. Terrible quest design. Boring NPCs. No attributes, and no mod that meaningfully addresses the fact for some reason. Endless boring dreugh dungeons, stormcloak camps, giant camps, bandit camps over and over with rare divergence from that.

Don't make the same mistake I did. Skyrim is irredeemable. How it is the best selling RPG of all time is beyond me. It's so bad my instinct is to assume even normies/non-gamers would hate it, and yet I know that not to be the case. How far we've fallen since the golden age of gaming.

 

[King Crispy]

Solid post, Ash. Hard to argue with any of that.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

I played it on release in 2011. Gave up in disgust after a mere 30 hours and never touched it again. Was sure to shit on it hard every time it was mentioned online and IRL. After 12 years, I thought maybe, just maybe, it can now be salvaged with over a decade of mods. I downloaded 100 gameplay mods - ones to make the combat better. Ones to make the NPCs less lifeless. All the reputable dungeon overhauls I could find. Weapon degredation. Skyshards, iceclaws and unique treasures to make exploration less boring. Saving only at beds to boost challenge and C&C. SkyUI, SkyHUD, offical patch and all the essentials. Mods to remove the level scaling and generous item. Soundtrack expansion to add variety. Survival mode to reduce the casualness. 70% of lockpicks removed. Expanded RPG systems - crafting, enchanting, magic. Mining gives small xp, reading unread books gives small xp. And so on and on. It was a much improved experience but ultimately still a hollow shell and overall unworthy game. Dungeons that are restrained in design. Towns that are no different from one another. Terrible quest design. Boring NPCs. No attributes, and no mod that meaningfully addresses the fact for some reason. Endless boring dreugh dungeons, stormcloak camps, giant camps, bandit camps over and over with rare divergence from that.

Don't make the same mistake I did. Skyrim is irredeemable. How it is the best selling RPG of all time is beyond me. It's so bad my instinct is to assume even normies/non-gamers would hate it, and yet I know that not to be the case. How far we've fallen since the golden age of gaming.

Very true.

Solid post, Ash. Hard to argue with any of that.

Says man after playing Skyrim for 10,000 hours.

 

[TheHeroOfTime]

Mostly of Skyrim NPCs do have a basic schedule. Take Riverwood as an example: The blacksmith do its job during the day and his wife goes out during morning to do some farming shit behind the inn. The guy who runs the sawmill does the same during morning, and his wife is the one who rules the village, sometimes stays at her home. The village shop does the same. All these character go to sleep during nights, closing their business. You can sneak in their houses, and check that they actually sleep. In Whiterun you can see a bunch of NPCs that live in the farms nearby go in and out the city regularly depending on the daytime. The only NPCs that doesn't have a schedule are the ones like innkeepers, the guards and some key story ones.

The best way to see the NPCs behavior is not using the waiting option to pass time. One thing I noticed is that waiting to pass time (Or sleeping) screws the npcs schedule. Like if you wait until it's 02:00 AM, you'll see a lot of npcs going to their houses at the same time in a very weird way. You have to wait again to see the streets empty.

 

[Krivol]

my recent playthrough of Skyrim

Die already

 

[King Crispy]

Fuck you, Mr. Nobody.

 

[Maxie]

I played it on release in 2011. Gave up in disgust after a mere 30 hours and never touched it again. Was sure to shit on it hard every time it was mentioned online and IRL. After 12 years, I thought maybe, just maybe, it can now be salvaged with over a decade of mods. I downloaded 100 gameplay mods - ones to make the combat better. Ones to make the NPCs less lifeless. All the reputable dungeon overhauls I could find. Weapon degredation. Skyshards, iceclaws and unique treasures to make exploration less boring. Saving only at beds to boost challenge and C&C. SkyUI, SkyHUD, offical patch and all the essentials. Mods to remove the level scaling and generous item. Soundtrack expansion to add variety. Survival mode to reduce the casualness. 70% of lockpicks removed. Expanded RPG systems - crafting, enchanting, magic. Mining gives small xp, reading unread books gives small xp. And so on and on. It was a much improved experience but ultimately still a hollow shell and overall unworthy game. Dungeons that are restrained in design. Towns that are no different from one another. Terrible quest design. Boring NPCs. No attributes, and no mod that meaningfully addresses the fact for some reason. Endless boring dreugh dungeons, stormcloak camps, giant camps, bandit camps over and over with rare divergence from that.

Don't make the same mistake I did. Skyrim is irredeemable. How it is the best selling RPG of all time is beyond me. It's so bad my instinct is to assume even normies/non-gamers would hate it, and yet I know that not to be the case. How far we've fallen since the golden age of gaming.

so the thing you played was a hodgepodge of mod shit nobody playtested with no coherent design about it, and you dare compare that to Todd's vision? let's be real, you haven't played Skyrim

 

[NaturallyCarnivorousSheep]

I think the shittiest part of skyrim is when my character gets KO'd by a dragon and then during rape animation the game glitches and crashes.